My Uneasy Response to BTS at the White House
Global K-pop sensation BTS accepted a warm invitation by the White House to bring awareness to anti-Asian hate and discrimination in the United States. BTS members have publicly stated that they themselves have suffered the mental effects of race-based hate directed at them.
But why did the U.S. president feel the need to import ambassadors to speak on behalf of domestic inequality? In this video, I go over how this was both the perfect and wrong decision. It's not the fault of BTS nor the White House. Rather, this event only highlighted how far behind we are when it comes to seeing the difference between Asians and Asian Americans, activism within the Asian American community, and lifting the anti-Asian discriminatory mindset in the United States (including among Asian Americans themselves).